She’d better act quickly before the nest of bees came back to buzz. Striding forward with a confidence that would tell passersby she belonged here, she slipped through the front door and up the stairs to the flat Nabokov had told her was Marin’s. Too bad he hadn’t been able to miraculously provide her with a key, but she’d spent a few coins on a set of lockpicks in anticipation of this moment, and it only took her a few anxious minutes to convince the door to give her entrance.

When she swung it open just wide enough to slide through, a silent huff slipped out at what met her eye. It was at least four times the size of the little cupboard she and Evgeni had found to rent. Sunlight poured in from generous windows, and the furniture couldn’t be more than five years old. He had artwork on his walls—the kind that looked expensive—and books on his shelves, their spines a rainbow of unintelligible English words.

From all Evgeni had told her—and from the house in Moscow she’d snooped through with a far bigger sneer—she knew the elder Marin brother had bowed and flattered his way into wealth he had no right to possess in Russia. But what sort of bargain must he have struck with the English to be given such a prime flat here, now? When she knew very well that finding anything in this part of the city was all but impossible?

Well, he would get his just deserts. And she would get to work to make that possible. She slid the deadbolt to make sure no one could surprise her and started her search in his bedroom, which seemed the likeliest place for him to hide Evgeni’s passport.

She looked in every drawer, every pocket of every jacket. She checked under the mattress, examined the seams to see if there was an opening he could have slid it into. Beneath rugs. In the few boxes she found. She jiggled each baseboard to see if any would pull away from the wall. She pulled off and squinted at every cushion and pillow in the flat.

Standing in the center of the living room an hour later, a few choice words were swirling about her mind. It had to be here somewhere. It had to be. She stared for a moment at the oil painting, a snarl curling her lip. She’d promised she’d put everything back the way she found it, but a sudden temptation to take a knife to the canvas nearly overcame her.

Nadya swallowed it down and strode over to the other piece, the photograph. The Eiffel Tower, mocking her. Reminding her of the time already wasted in Paris. Of the German officers somewhere in the French countryside whose names she must discover soon.